SENTENCING STATEMENTS

On sentencing, Lord Arthurson said:

"Kevin Campbell, you have today been convicted of the murder of a vulnerable 41 year old woman, Ms Mairi Doherty, on a tenement staircase in John Street, Dunoon.  In the early hours of 23 July 2022, you kicked your victim on a top floor landing and then, subsequently, from a lower position on the tenement stairs, pushed her on the back with sufficient force to cause her to fall down a set of concrete or stone steps and sustain severe blunt force trauma to the head, whereby she consequently died of her injuries at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, Glasgow, on 26 July 2022.

Your victim died from a head injury with fractures to the skull which caused bleeding over the dura of the brain and cardiac arrest.  Despite commendable resuscitation efforts and excellent neurological treatment, Ms Doherty died because she had sustained at your hands an essentially unsurvivable brain injury.  She had additionally suffered a left sided pelvic fracture and multiple rib fractures together with a left sided pneumothorax.  The scale of the blunt force head injury sustained here is perhaps best understood from evidence given by the forensic pathologist to the effect that the cause of death was raised intra‑cranial pressure due to bleeding over and under the dura, causing swelling to the brain, which actually shifted downwards into the opening of the spinal cord, occasioning haemorrhage of the brain stem.

I pause to observe that members of the family of Ms Doherty have, with quiet dignity and close attention, sat in on each day of this case, listening to the very disturbing evidence necessarily adduced during the trial.  I have read the powerful impact statement prepared on behalf of Ms Doherty’s family by her two brothers. Their loss and the manner of that loss, and in particular the devastating effect of that loss upon Ms Doherty’s mother, is unimaginable, and will doubtless live with them as a family, causing them much grief and pain, for the foreseeable future.

You are aged 45.  You have to date accrued 27 groups of previous convictions and been the subject of 16 prior custodial sentences, all bar one at summary level.  You have two directly relevant prior convictions for assault.

I have listened with care to the brief submissions advanced on your behalf in mitigation today by your senior counsel, and note in particular what was said regarding your family circumstances.

The sentence for the crime of murder is fixed by law and is one of imprisonment for life.  The court requires as part of the sentencing exercise in cases of this nature to select a period known as the punishment part of that fixed disposal. The punishment part is the number of years which you must serve before you can be considered for release on life licence.  When the court sets this tariff it is not in any sense appointing the time when you will be released.  Instead, the court is fixing the number of years which must be served by you before you can actually apply for release.  The punishment part does not take into account the need for public protection.  That important matter is taken into account by the Parole Board for Scotland if and when any application is made by you in due course for your release.  The punishment part does, however, take into account the sentencing requirements of retribution and deterrence.

In selecting an appropriate punishment part in your case, I take into account principally the gravity of the crime of murder of which you stand convicted, together with, albeit to a considerably lesser degree, your record of criminal antecedents.  

The crime of murder committed by you in this case was unplanned, but, standing the nature of your attack upon your vulnerable victim, the catastrophic nature and scale of the injuries inflicted upon her by your criminal actions, and indeed the whole surrounding circumstances, the jury in this case have determined that you demonstrated a total indifference to Ms Doherty’s fate and that accordingly your attack upon her was a wholly murderous one.  On your own account, observing her in a pool of blood at the bottom of the flight of stairs, you returned to your flat and went to bed.  On your arrest by the police the next morning you made disparaging and callous remarks about your victim.  As you looked down the tenement stairs, having pushed Ms Doherty down these stairs, thereby visiting upon her the unsurvivable injuries spoken to by the pathologist, a neighbour observing you through a door spyhole heard you say a word which sounded like “Rita”.  I have no doubt, having heard the whole evidence at this trial, that the word you uttered was in all likelihood the word “retard”.

Turning now, therefore, to disposal, on charge two on this indictment I now pass upon you the mandatory sentence of imprisonment for life.  I fix the punishment part of that disposal at a period of 17 years.  This sentence will be backdated to the date of your initial remand into custody in these proceedings, namely 25 July 2022."